19 September
2006 - A $4.6 million project to improve understanding
and management of salinity in the Australian landscape
was launched today.
Australian Government Ministers
for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry, Peter
McGauran, and the Environment and Heritage, Senator
Ian Campbell, said that over the next two years,
the funding would allow communities in the Murray-Darling
Basin to identify and undertake stream sampling
in catchment areas that were at risk from salinity.
“Our understanding of salinity
and its role in Australian landscapes has changed
significantly over the past five to six years,”
Mr McGauran said.
“We have known for some time
that salt can be a problem in the Australian landscape,
but we now know that it is only likely to become
a problem when it is brought close to the surface
by a change in the way water moves through the
soil.
“This has become increasingly
evident as the drought has taken hold and work
funded by the National Action Plan has become
available,” Mr McGauran said.
Senator Campbell said that salinity
remained a significant challenge for Australia.
“We are still coming to terms
with the scale of the salinity issue and the options
for dealing with it,” he said.
“One of the ways salinity can
be managed more effectively is by knowing the
location of salty ‘hot spots’ in the landscape.
Community participation in stream sampling is
an effective way of identifying these areas.
Mr McGauran said the project,
managed by the Bureau of Rural Sciences, would
focus on priority region catchments. Funding is
provided through the Australian Government’s National
Action Plan for Salinity and Water Quality.
Catchment Management Organisations
to receive funding under the new project include
Goulburn Broken, Mallee, North Central, and Wimmera
in Victoria, Border Rivers Gwydir, Central West,
Lachlan, Murray, Murrumbidgee, Namoi, and Western
in New South Wales, the Murray Darling Natural
Resource Management Board in South Australia,
and Murray Darling Committee as a partnership
with Condamine Alliance (including Maranoa-Balonne)
and South West Natural Resource Management Group
in Queensland.
The information gathered will
be used by the Catchment Management Organisations
to plan and target salinity and water management
programmes within their catchments and across
the Murray-Darling Basin as a whole. More information
on salinity in the Australian landscape can be
found at www.brs.gov.au/water
Rob Broadfield (Senator Campbell’s office)
Nancy Joseph (Minister McGauran’s office)
